Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

Chapter 3 

Gaining and Using Target 

Audience Insights 

Understanding your target audience—its culture, lifestyle, 

behaviors, interests, and needs—is vital to developing an 

effective counter-marketing program. Market research can 

help you gain those insights.1 

Once you’ve determined who your target audience is, you’ll need to 

gather relevant information about that audience. This information will 

help you tailor your counter-marketing messages and materials and 

ensure that your programs will be effective. 

One way to gain insights about your target audience is through market 

research, which can help you understand the audience’s motivations, 

interests, needs, culture, lifestyles, and behaviors and determine the best 

channel(s) for reaching the audience. Market research can help you 

explore ideas for activities and concepts for messages and identify and 

develop stronger ideas and eliminate the weaker ones. It can be used to 

pretest messages and materials in near-final stages, to fine-tune the 

process while changes can be made, and to serve as a “disaster check.” 

Market research also can be a mechanism for pilot testing new tactics 

and interventions before using them more broadly. Market research for 

development of counter-marketing efforts is often called formative 

research. Other types of research for the purposes of process and outcome evaluation are discussed in Chapter 5: Evaluating the Success of 

Your Counter-Marketing Program. 

1 This chapter has been excerpted and adapted from the National Cancer Institute’s Making Health 

Communication Programs Work: A Planner’s Guide (2002). 

In This Chapter


• The Importance of 

Market Research 

• Market Research on 

a Limited Budget 

• Qualitative and 

Quantitative 

Research Methods 

• Qualitative Research 

• Quasi-Quantitative 

Research 

• Quantitative 

Research 

• Other Market 

Research Tools 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 51 
This chapter describes market research tools 

commonly used to gain insights into target 

audiences.2 These tools include focus groups, 

individual in-depth interviews, central 

location intercept interviews, theater-style 

pretests, and surveys. Diaries and activity logs, 

gatekeeper reviews, and readability testing are 

also described. 

Some tools are better suited for certain purposes than others, so most programs use a 

combination of methods. For example, focus 

groups with members of your target audience 

can help you learn which approaches, messages, and channels are most likely to succeed 

with that audience. The focus groups could be 

augmented with individual in-depth interviews to probe more deeply into motivations, 

particularly if the issues are controversial or 

very personal or if the audience members are 

influenced heavily by their peers. Messages 

and materials might be tested through central 

location intercept interviews, in which 

respondents are recruited and interviewed at 

malls or other public settings, or through 

theater-style pretests, which use a simulated 

television-viewing environment to replicate a 

real-life viewing experience. Use of multiple 

tools can help confirm the validity of your 

findings. 

Regardless of the tools you use, be sure to 

apply the results. Market research can provide 

critical data at various stages of your 

program, but that information won’t do much 

good if it isn’t used. Other chapters in this 

manual explain when and how to incorporate 

your results into program planning and 

development. (In particular, see Chapter 2: 

Planning Your Counter-Marketing Program, 

Chapter 4: Reaching Specific Populations, and 

Chapter 7: Advertising.) 

Market research generally isn’t something you 

can do on your own. Your program could stray 

off course if you use the wrong method, use 

the methods incorrectly, recruit the wrong type 

or number of participants, or misinterpret 

results. Unless you have the appropriate skills 

and experience, do-it-yourself market research 

can yield the same kinds of results as do-ityourself plumbing. This chapter is designed to 

give you background on methods and techniques that will help you work with market 

research professionals. However, don’t turn 

over complete control of the research to your 

ad agency or market research firm. You need to 

be involved in every step of the process. 

The Importance of Market Research 

Sometimes program managers want to 

eliminate market research to cut costs, 

especially when the budget is tight. However, 

spending some money on market research up 

front can save your program money in the 

long run. The initial expenditure can help 

ensure that the program elements are likely to 

2 Some of the research methods described here may require Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval. Nearly all 

government agencies, academic institutions, and other organizations require an assessment of the impact on 

human subjects involved in qualitative and quantitative research, including the protection of collected data. Some 

data collection efforts are exempt from IRB approval. For each research project undertaken, it is recommended 

that you consult the IRB expert in your organization. 

52 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

be effective, rather than having no impact or, 

even worse, creating a backlash. If you air 

ineffective ads, you lose much more money in 

media placement funds than you would have 

spent on market research to determine the 

likelihood of success. Unfortunately, this is 

only one example of the many negative 

outcomes of insufficient market research. 

Market Research on a Limited 

Budget 

Few program managers have the luxury of 

conducting as much market research as they 

would like. When faced with a tight budget, 

try the following: 

■	 Contact others in tobacco control to find 

out what research they’ve done. Can you 

use their findings in developing your 

own program? Do they have research 

designs and instruments you can use as 

models? Can you solicit advice from 

experienced managers on making the 

most of your tight budget? Can they give 

you advice or referrals to resources from 

other experts, such as those in your 

community with expertise in commercial marketing and advertising or in 

market research? Have you contacted a 

project officer or health communication 

staff member from the Centers for 

Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) 

for advice, referrals, or both? 

■	 Be sure your program plan fully explains 

the need for market research and spells 

out a thorough market research plan. If 

you can’t secure the funds you need this 

year, try to convince decision makers 

now that investing in research next year 

will pay off. Point out that market 

research is a core component of effective 

counter-marketing programs. 

■	 Beware of too many shortcuts. You need 

to conduct enough market research to 

feel confident that the findings provide 

clear direction. For example, if you’ve 

tested message concepts in a few focus 

groups and the results are inconclusive, 

you probably need to conduct a few 

more focus groups. 

■	 Whenever possible, consult with market 

research experts during planning and 

implementation, even if you have to cut 

corners elsewhere. For example, you 

may be able to save money by recruiting 

research participants through community organizations instead of paying a 

contractor to handle recruiting. 

■	 Always ask prospective contractors and 

vendors for nonprofit rates. 

■	 Ask professionals with market research 

experience if they’d be willing to donate 

their time. 

■	 Use a market researcher you can trust 

to be objective and to not “color” results 

to match a program or advertising 

agency bias. 

Qualitative and Quantitative 

Research Methods 

Two main categories of market research can be 

conducted with target audiences: qualitative 

and quantitative research. Qualitative research 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 53 
seeks to gain in-depth knowledge about 

perceptions, motivations, and behaviors. It can 

answer the questions “why,” “when,” and 

“how”—questions that are critical to developing effective media campaigns. Common 

methods of qualitative research include focus 

groups and individual in-depth interviews. 

Quantitative research seeks to provide estimates of knowledge, beliefs, attitudes, and 

behaviors in a population of interest. It can 

answer the questions “How many?” “How 

much?” and “How often?” Common methods 

of quantitative research include surveys using 

random sampling and convenience sampling. 

Because each approach provides a different 

kind of information, it’s often best to use both. 

Qualitative research methods should be used 

for the following purposes: 

■	 To develop materials and to determine 

reactions to concepts or draft materials 

■	 To explore a topic or idea 

■	 To gain insights into a target audience’s 

lifestyle, culture, motivations, behaviors, 

and preferences 

■	 To understand the reasons behind the 

results from quantitative research 

Qualitative research should be conducted by 

using the following methods: 

■	 Select a small group of people on the 

basis of certain common characteristics. 

■	 Convene a discussion through focus 

groups or in-depth interviews or 

observe individuals’ behaviors in their 

homes, schools, malls, supermarkets, or 

other settings. 

■	 Keep the discussion somewhat 

unstructured, so participants are free to 

give any response, rather than choosing 

from a list of possible responses. 

Use a discussion or interview guide to make 

sure you ask questions relevant to your 

research purpose, but be prepared to revise the 

sequence of questions on the basis of participants’ responses, rather than having to stick to 

a set order. (See Step 5 in the section on 

Designing and Conducting Focus Groups or 

Individual In-Depth Interviews, later in this 

chapter, for discussion of how to develop a 

moderator’s guide.) 

Qualitative research results aren’t quantifiable 

and can’t be subjected to statistical analysis or 

projected to the population from which 

respondents were drawn. The participants 

don’t constitute a representative sample, the 

samples are relatively small, and not all 

participants are asked precisely the same 

questions. Even though you can collect very 

valuable information from qualitative 

research, and even if you conduct a great deal 

of it, you won’t get findings that you can 

project to the target audience as a whole. For 

that, you need quantitative research. 

Quantitative research methods should be 

used for the following purposes: 

■	 To determine “how many,” “how much,” 

and “how often” 

54 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

■	 To profile a target audience for communication planning, such as measuring which proportion of the audience 

thinks or behaves in certain ways 

■	 To measure how well your program is 

doing (See Chapter 5: Evaluating the 

Success of Your Counter-Marketing 

Program for a more complete discussion 

of surveys and program evaluation.) 

Quantitative research should be conducted by 

using the following methods: 

■	 Select a large group of people. 

■	 Use a structured questionnaire containing predominantly closed-ended or 

forced-choice questions. 

Quantitative research results can be analyzed by 

using statistical techniques that can provide 

estimates of behavior or beliefs of interest for 

the target population. These results can be 

representative of the population from which 

respondents were drawn if they were randomly 

selected. In some cases, oversampling of 

specific population groups is necessary to 

provide data on those groups. In addition, the 

results can help in segmenting broad target 

populations (e.g., high school students) into 

more specific groups with similar 

characteristics. 

Quasi-quantitative market research tools 

(e.g., central location intercept interviews 

and theater-style pretests) are usually used 

to pretest messages and materials. Although 

these tools are used for measurement and 

typically involve questionnaires with mostly 

forced-choice questions, the results can’t be 

projected to the audience as a whole, because 

participants aren’t chosen in a way that 

produces a representative sample. 

Here’s a closer look at the different research 

methods and tools, along with a discussion of 

how to conduct the research and use the 

results to inform your project. 

Qualitative Research 

Use qualitative research to: 

■	 Learn what drives the audience’s behav­


iors and understand what is needed to


influence their awareness, knowledge,


attitudes, intentions, and behaviors 


■	 Determine whether your materials


communicate the intended messages


effectively and persuasively


■	 Understand why your program is or 


isn’t working as expected


■	 Gain insights into findings on the effec­


tiveness of the program’s implementation


The most common tools used in qualitative 

market research are focus groups and individual in-depth interviews. Many innovative 

methods may also be appropriate: 

■	 Friendship pairs, in which best friends


(commonly teens or preteens) are


recruited to discuss sensitive subjects


■	 In-home observations, in which you


gain permission to spend one or two


hours in someone’s home to learn about


their habits and practices


Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 55 
■	 Video logs, in which individuals are 

given video cameras or still cameras 

to record their environment and 

daily activities 

Because the methods for focus groups and indepth individual interviews are similar, they 

will be discussed together in this section, using 

instructions for focus groups as a guide. 

Focus Groups 

In a focus group, a skilled moderator uses a 

discussion guide to facilitate a one- to twohour discussion among five to 10 participants. Typically the session is conducted in 

person. If that isn’t possible because of 

distance or other factors, another option is to 

conduct the session by telephone or computer. The moderator keeps the session on 

track while participants talk freely. As new 

topics related to the material emerge, the 

moderator asks additional questions. 

Focus groups are commonly used to 

accomplish the following purposes: 

■ Develop a communication strategy by: 

– 	 Learning about feelings, motivators, and experiences related to a 

health topic 

–	 Exploring the feasibility of potential 

actions from the audience’s viewpoint 

– 	 Identifying barriers to those actions 

– 	 Exploring which benefits the 

audience finds most compelling and 

believes can result from taking a 

particular action 

– 	 Learning about the audience’s use of 

settings, channels, and activities 

– 	 Capturing the language the audience 

uses to discuss a health issue 

– 	 Identifying cultural differences that 

may affect message delivery 

■	 Explore reactions to message concepts 

(concept testing) by: 

– 	 Identifying concepts that do or don’t 

resonate and learning why 

– 	 Triggering the creative thinking of 

communication professionals 

– 	 Showing others what audience 

members think and how they talk 

about a health issue 

■	 Develop hypotheses (broad questions) 

for quantitative research, and identify 

the range of responses that should be 

included in closed-ended questionnaires 

■	 Provide insights into the results of 

quantitative research by obtaining indepth information from audience 

members 

■	 Brainstorm for possible program


improvements


Pros: 

■	 Group interaction can elicit in-depth 

thought and discussion. 

■	 Group interaction can encourage 

brainstorming, because respondents 

can build on each other’s ideas. 

56 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

■ Moderators have considerable 

opportunities to probe responses. 

■ 

■ 

Each person is limited to about 10 to 15 

minutes of talk time. 

■	 Focus groups provide richer data about 

the complexities of the audience’s 

thoughts and behaviors than surveys do. 

The moderator might ask leading 

questions of the group or might neglect 

to probe for critical insights. 

■	 Groups provide feedback from a 

number of individuals in a relatively 

short time. 

Individual In-Depth Interviews 

The process, uses, benefits, and drawbacks of 

individual in-depth interviews are similar to 

those of focus groups, except that the 

interviewer speaks with one person at a time. 

In-person interviews can take place at a 

central facility or at the participant’s home or 

place of business. As with focus groups, when 

individual interviews can’t be conducted in 

person, they can be conducted by phone or 

computer. Although the interviews take more 

total time, responses usually are less biased, 

because each participant is interviewed alone 

and isn’t influenced by others’ responses. 


Cons: 

■	

■	

■	

Findings can’t be projected to the target 

audience as a whole. 

Focus groups can be labor intensive and 

expensive, especially when they’re 

conducted in multiple locations. 

Group responses don’t necessarily 

reflect individuals’ opinions, because 

some individuals might dominate the


discussion, influence others’ opinions, 

or both. In addition, the facilitator might 


not be able to get everyone’s reactions to


every question.


Insights From Focus Groups 

In a series of 24 focus groups conducted in four U.S. cities by CDC and three state tobacco 

control programs, youth were exposed to 10 antitobacco ads developed for youth audiences. 

Participants were asked to rate the ads on the basis of how likely the ads were to make them 

“stop and think about not using tobacco.” The four ads consistently rated highest had a 

strong message about the negative health consequences of tobacco. Three of the four ads 

used real stories in a testimonial format to share the risks of using tobacco. 

An important insight gleaned from the research was that youth seemed to be more affected 

by the thought of living with the negative consequences of tobacco use than dying from 

them (Teenage Research Unlimited 1999). 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 57 
An Experience With One-on-One 

Interviews 

A television and movie actor who had lost 

several family members to tobacco offered his 

time for a tobacco control ad. An advertising 

concept and script were developed to encourage smokers to consider quitting by having 

them think about how their own death from 

tobacco use would affect their loved ones. 

Before producing the ads, the sponsoring 

organization conducted one-on-one interviews with adult smokers to ensure that the 

script and visual presentations would clearly 

and persuasively communicate the intended 

message. The smokers were shown the ad 

concept and asked their reactions to it 

through a variety of questions. Individual 

interviews were used instead of focus groups, 

because it was important for the smokers to 

be honest and vulnerable. The sponsoring 

organization was concerned that if smokers 

were in a focus group together, they might 

become defensive about the ad’s message that 

their tobacco use could ultimately hurt their 

loved ones. 

The approach worked. The one-on-one 

interviews elicited honest, heartfelt responses 

from the smokers. The interviews also revealed that many respondents didn’t recognize 

the actor. As a result, the decision was made 

to identify him on screen at the beginning of 

the ad. In addition, the original script included a line noting how the actor’s grandfather 

couldn’t stop smoking even though he knew it 

was making him sick. Respondents didn’t find 

that line credible. They believed the grandfather should have—and would have—quit if 

he knew smoking was making him sick. These 

respondents said they would stop as soon as 

they found out their smoking was causing 

them serious harm. Whether or not that perception was realistic, the script was changed 

to focus on the grandfather’s suffering, which 

research respondents sympathized with, 

rather than focusing on his failure in quitting. 

Designing and Conducting Focus 

Groups or Individual In-Depth 

Interviews 

Here are seven major steps for conducting 

focus groups and individual in-depth 

interviews: 

1. 	 Plan the research. 

2. 	 Choose the location and format for 

focus groups or interviews. 

3. 	 Draft a recruitment screener. 

4. Recruit participants. 

5. 	 Develop a moderator’s guide. 

6. 	 Conduct the focus groups or interviews. 

7. 	 Analyze and use results. 

Step 1: Plan the research. 

Determine the following information: 

■	 What you want to learn. Decide how 

you’ll use the results from the focus 

group discussion or individual interview 

before you conduct the research. Prepare 

the questions you want answered, then 

make sure the moderator and interviewer guide will provide the answers. 

(See Step 5 for more information on 

developing a moderator’s guide.) You’ll 

use these questions to analyze the 

results of the discussions and to 

organize the report on the focus group 

discussion or individual interview. 

■	 When you need to have that 

information. Your timing needs will 

58 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

determine the way you’ll need to recruit and, 

to some extent, your costs. 

■	 How you’ll apply what you learn. Make 

sure the information you’ll gain will be 

actionable. 

■	 Your budget. The size of your budget will 

dictate how many groups or interviews 

you can conduct, in how many locations, 

and how much of the work you will be 

able to delegate to contractors. 

■	 Your criteria for participants. Use the 

following suggestions to help you select 

participants. 

– 	 Choose people who are typical of your 

audience. Participants should have the 

same behavioral, demographic, and 

psychographic characteristics as your 

audience. (Psychographics are a set of 

variables that describes an individual 

in terms of overall approach to life, 

including personality traits, values, 

beliefs, preferences, habits, and 

behaviors.) You may want to conduct 

separate groups with “doers,” who 

already engage in the desired behavior, 

and “nondoers,” who don’t engage in 

the desired behavior. This strategy will 

help to identify what actions the doers 

take and why. Those actions then can 

be explored with the nondoers. 

– 	 Do not select experts. Exclude market 

researchers and advertising professionals, because of their familiarity 

with the methods, and exclude those 

who have, or might be perceived by 

other group members as having,


expertise in the subject matter. For


example, exclude health professionals


from focus groups when the topic is


related to health. In addition, anyone


involved in the production, distri­


bution, or marketing of tobacco


products should be excluded from


focus groups related to tobacco


control. 


– 	 Match participants by gender, race, 

age, level of formal education, or 

other characteristic(s) within each 

group. Participants with matched 

characteristics are more likely to 

express themselves freely. If your 

target audience includes people with 

different demographic traits, consider 

whether you need to conduct separate 

sessions for each audience segment to 

determine whether differences 

between the groups are significant. 

– 	 Select people who are relatively 

inexperienced with interviews. Participants’ reactions should be spontaneous. This consideration will help you 

to avoid questioning “professional” 

respondents who have participated in 

many focus groups or individual 

interviews and thus may lead or 

monopolize the discussion. Recruitment screeners typically exclude 

people who have participated in 

qualitative research in the past six 

months. (See Step 3 later in this 

section, for further discussion of 

recruitment screeners.) 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 59 
■	 The number of focus group discussions 

or interviews you’ll conduct. If you’re 

using focus groups, conduct at least two 

groups with each audience segment. For 

example, if you’re conducting separate 

groups with men and women, you’ll 

need at least four groups: two with men 

and two with women. If you’re using 

individual interviews, conduct about 10 

interviews per audience segment. 

If audience perceptions vary or the audience 

feedback is unclear, you may want to conduct 

additional groups or interviews, especially if 

you revise the moderator/interviewer guide to 

further explore unresolved issues. 

Step 2: Choose the location and format 

for focus groups or interviews. 

You can conduct focus groups or interviews in 

several ways: 

■	 Commercial focus group facilities can 

recruit participants. These facilities offer 

audio recording equipment, video 

recording equipment, or both and oneway mirrors with observation rooms. 

However, commercial facilities are often 

expensive and may not be available in 

small towns. 

■	 Teleconference services can set up 

telephone focus groups. Most 

teleconference services allow observers 

to listen without being heard. Some 

have the capability to allow the 

moderator to see a list of participants 

(with a symbol next to the one currently 

speaking) or to see notes sent by a 

technician from observers listening to 

the call. Some teleconference services 

also can recruit participants. 

■	 You can conduct focus groups or 

interviews in meeting rooms at office 

buildings, schools, places of worship, 

homes, or other locations. If an 

observation room with a one-way 

mirror isn’t available, allow staff to listen 

by hooking up speakers or closed-circuit 

TV in a nearby room or by audio 

recording the session, video recording 

the session, or both. In some cases, you 

may have one or two quiet observers 

taking notes in the room. 

Step 3: Draft a recruitment screener. 

A recruitment screener is a short questionnaire 

that is administered to potential participants, 

typically by telephone, to ensure that they meet 

the criteria you developed in Step 1. Your 

contractor, if you have one, will administer this 

questionnaire. The screener should help you 

to exclude people who know one another or 

have expertise in the subject of the sessions. 

Potential participants can be told the general 

subject area (e.g., “a health topic”), but they 

shouldn’t be told the specific subject. If 

participants know the subject in advance, they 

may formulate ideas or study to become more 

knowledgeable about the subject. Furthermore, if 

participants know one another, they may speak 

less freely. For similar reasons, they also shouldn’t 

be told who the sponsor is. 

60 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

Table 3.1: Pros and Cons of Formats for Focus Groups and Individual Interviews 

Format Pros Cons 

Face to Face 

Moderator/interviewer 

and participants are in 

one room, usually around 

a table; observers (members of the research team) 

are behind a one-way 

mirror. 

• Body language can be assessed. 

• Observers can be present without distracting participants. 

• If the session is videotaped, it 

can be shared with others who 

couldn’t attend. 

• Participants give undivided 

attention. 

• Responders lose anonymity. 

• The session has higher travel 

expenses because of multiple 

locales. 

• The session may be a logistical 

challenge in rural areas or small 

towns. 

Telephone 

Moderator/interviewer 

and participants are on a 

conference call; observers 

listen. 

• The session is more convenient 

for participants and observers. 

• Participants can easily include 

people in rural areas or small 

towns, as well as the homebound. 

• Relative anonymity may result 

in more frank discussion of 

sensitive issues. 

• Nonverbal reactions can’t be 

assessed. 

• It’s more difficult to get reactions 

to visuals. (They can be sent 

ahead of time, but you still have 

less control over exposure.) 

• Participants can be distracted by 

their surroundings. 

• There may be noise interference 

from callers’ environments. 

Internet Chat Sessions 

Moderator and participants “chat” while 

observers read. 

• A complete record of session is 

instantly available. 

• Relative anonymity may result 

in more frank discussion of 

sensitive issues. 

• The session is useful only for 

participants comfortable with 

this mode of communication. 

• The relatively slow pace limits 

topics that can be covered. 

• There’s no way to assess whether participants meet recruitment criteria. 

• Body language or tone of voice 

can’t be assessed. 

• It’s more difficult to get reactions to 

visual presentations. (They can be 

sent ahead of time, but you still 

have less control over exposure.) 

• Participants can be distracted by 

their surroundings. 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 61 
Contracting With Commercial Facilities 

One way to conduct face-to-face focus groups or individual interviews is to contract with a company that 

specializes in this service. Before you contract with a commercial facility, prepare a specification sheet 

detailing all the services you need, and if you will be asking the facility to recruit participants, prepare a 

profile of your audience. Vendors will use this information to estimate the project’s cost and to develop bids. 

Use this checklist to decide which vendors to consider. Each vendor should provide these items: 

❑	 Descriptions of past projects 

❑	 Descriptions of or a list of clients (If you are unfamiliar with the vendor, check the company’s


references.) 


❑	 Location of the facility (Is it conveniently located? Accessible by public transportation? If not, does 

the vendor provide transportation assistance, such as taxi money or van service? What does this 

add to the cost?) 

❑	 Size of the interview room(s) 

❑	 Diagram of the table/seating arrangements (What shape is the table? How big is the table? 


Where does the moderator sit?)


❑	 Size and features of the observation room(s) 

❑	 Details about audio recording and video recording arrangements and costs 

❑	 Details about food arrangements for participants and observers, including staff from your


organization and ad agency


❑	 Description of the vendor’s moderator services 

❑	 Description of the vendor’s method of recruitment, including the database used and the


geographic area the company covers


❑	 Recommendations for participant incentives 

❑	 Reasonable rates for vendor services (Ask for nonprofit rates.) 

❑	 Examples of focus group summaries/reports, moderator notes, screeners (short questionnaires 

used to recruit potential participants), and other documents produced by the vendor for other 

clients if you’re going to ask the vendor to provide these services 

62 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

The screener should guarantee the approximate 

mix of respondents for a group that isn’t separated by certain characteristics, such as a balance of 

men and women in a mixed-gender group. (See 

Appendices 3.1 and 3.2 for sample screeners.) 

Step 4: Recruit participants. 

Choose appropriate participants for the focus 

groups or interviews, so your research is more 

reliable. Even if a contractor does the recruiting, make sure the screener is followed carefully so that only those who qualify will be 

included in the research. 

Participants should be recruited by telephone 

one to three weeks before the sessions. How 

you identify potential participants depends on 

the type of people they are and the resources 

you have. Focus group facilities typically 

identify members of the audience through 

their own databases. If you do the recruiting, 

you might need to run an ad in a local publication, work with community organizations, 

purchase lists of phone numbers of individuals 

with certain characteristics, or identify professionals through a relevant association or 

mailing list service. Here are some ways 

to recruit: 

■	 Hire a focus group facility or independent 

recruiter. Two directories of facilities are 

the American Marketing Association’s 

GreenBook: Worldwide Directory of Focus 

Group Companies and Services (2003) 

and the Marketing Research 

Association’s Blue Book (2003). 

■	 If you have many facilities and recruiters 

to choose from, consider getting recommendations from local companies or 

organizations that conduct qualitative 

research. 

■	 Enlist help from students in a university 

marketing research or advertising class 

if they are knowledgeable and 

experienced in focus group research. 

■	 Work through gatekeepers such as 

teachers (for students); instructors for 

courses of English as a second language 

(for recent immigrants); health care 

systems (for patients, physicians, or 

nurses); and religious institutions or 

community organizations whose 

members meet your audience criteria. 

(A small donation may encourage an 

organization to recruit for you.) 

Getting People to Show Up 

To ensure that enough people show up, offer an 

incentive (usually money) and recruit more 

people than you need. If everyone shows up, 

select those who best fit your screening criteria, 

thank the extra participants, give them the 

agreed-on incentive, and ask them to leave. You 

also can make sure you have enough people by: 

■	 Scheduling sessions at times convenient 

for your potential participants (e.g., 

during lunchtime or after work) 

■	 Choosing a safe and convenient site 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 63 
■	 Providing transportation or reimbursing 

participants for agreed-on transportation costs 

■	 Arranging for child care 

■	 Letting participants know you’ll provide 

snacks or refreshments 

Recruiting for Telephone Interviews 

If you’re recruiting for telephone interviews, 

create a spreadsheet with spaces for the 

following information about each potential 

participant: the time zone in which the person 

is located; the date, time, and number at which 

they should be called; and the result of each 

call (e.g., scheduled an interview, no answer, 

busy, or refused). This type of spreadsheet also 

can be helpful in planning in-person interviews and using other research methods. 

Step 5: Develop a moderator’s guide. 

The quality of the moderator’s guide is critical 

to the success of focus groups. The guide tells 

the moderator or interviewer what information you want from the sessions and helps him 

or her keep the discussion on track and on 

time. Your contractor will draft the guide for 

you if you need this service. Before it is drafted, 

you’ll need to determine the following 

information: 

■	 What you want to learn from the focus 

group or interview 

■	 How to apply what you learn 

■	 What tools (e.g., descriptive information, message concepts, or other draft 

creative work) you’ll need to provide for 

the sessions 

You should write questions for the guide that 

relate to the purposes you’ve identified. Most 

questions should be open-ended, so participants can provide more in-depth responses 

than just “yes” or “no.” Also, make sure the 

questions aren’t worded in a way that will 

prompt a particular response. For example, 

don’t ask, “What problems are you having with 

quitting smoking?” Instead, you could phrase 

the question more neutrally by asking, “What 

problems do smokers have with quitting?” 

Participants will then be more likely to offer 

honest responses, rather than the answers they 

think you want. The time and depth of exploration given to each issue should reflect the 

issue’s importance to your purposes. (See 

Appendices 3.3 and 3.4 for examples of 

moderator’s guides.) 

In the focus groups, don’t include questions 

for group discussion if you need individual 

responses. However, you can have the 

moderator give each participant a selfadministered questionnaire to complete before 

the session. Participants also can be asked to 

individually rank certain items (e.g., potential 

actions, benefits, or message concepts) on 

paper during a session to combine individual 

and group reactions. 

Step 6: Conduct the focus groups 

or interviews. 

Focus groups and interviews typically begin 

with the moderator welcoming participants 

and briefing them on the process (e.g., that 

64 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

Working With Community Organizations (Partners) To Conduct Focus Groups 

You’ll need a formal or informal agreement to conduct focus groups with your partner. Working with your 

contact at the partner organization, develop an agreement that includes the following elements: 

■	 A description of your organization 

■	 A description of the material/topic to be discussed and its purpose 

■	 Details about participants to be recruited 

■	 An outline of activities involved 

■	 The incentives you are offering the partner organization and/or the participants 

■	 A detailed explanation of why the partner should not reveal details about the topic to participants 

in advance 

■	 How you will protect participants’ confidentiality 

■	 If and how you will share the information learned 

Once you have an agreement, decide how you will recruit participants. One idea is to conduct your 

research as part of one of the partner organization’s regular meetings. Here are the pros and cons of 

this approach: 

Pros: 

■	 Little extra effort is required to recruit participants. 

■	 Minimal or no incentives may be involved. 

■	 Your partner’s regular, convenient, and familiar meeting place can be used. 

Cons: 

■	 You have little control over the number of people who will come or the composition of the focus 

group. Respondents are likely to know one another, which will affect the focus group’s dynamics 

and make results less reliable. 

■	 Because a focus group may last one or two hours, it is difficult to place it on the agenda of a


regular meeting.


■	 Scheduling the focus group for the near future may be difficult, because many organizations set


their calendars months in advance.


Continues 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 65 
Working With Community Organizations (Partners) To Conduct Focus Groups 

(cont.) 

An alternative is to recruit your partner’s members/constituents to come to a special meeting. This 

approach offers the ability to screen participants. In addition, participants may be less distracted in a 

meeting solely devoted to your research than in a focus group conducted as part of a regular meeting. 

Scheduling the focus group immediately before or after the regular meeting may make it more convenient for participants. A person with the organization—or you, on behalf of the organization—can ask 

members/constituents to participate. Also, if you’re providing refreshments or incentives, let participants 

know in advance to encourage them to attend and to stay through the entire meeting. 

If you do the recruiting, you’ll have more control over what people are told about the focus group and 

you’ll be able to screen potential participants. However, recruiting takes a significant amount of time, 

and organization members/constituents may be more likely to participate if they are asked by someone 

they know. 

If the member organization recruits participants, you need to provide the recruiter with detailed instructions. These instructions must include (1) a written description of the general (not specific) topic, which 

should be read to potential participants verbatim, and (2) a questionnaire to screen participants. 

there are no right or wrong answers, that it’s 

important to speak one at a time and maintain 

confidentiality, that observers will be present, 

and that the session will be recorded).3 In focus 

groups, participants introduce themselves to 

the group, noting information relevant to the 

discussion (e.g., number of attempts to quit 

smoking and number of cigarettes smoked each 

day). Next, the moderator asks a few simple 

“icebreaker” questions to help participants get 

used to the process and reduce their anxiety. 

This step also helps the moderator develop a 

rapport with the participants. Again, to reduce 

the risk of introducing bias, the sponsor of the 

research should not be revealed. 

The session then shifts to an in-depth investigation of participants’ perspectives and issues. 

Following the moderator’s guide, the moderator manages the session and ensures that all 

topics are covered without overtly directing the 

discussion. Participants are encouraged to 

express their views and even disagree with one 

another. The moderator doesn’t simply accept 

what participants say but probes to learn 

about thoughts and attitudes. The moderator 

also seeks opinions from all participants, so 

everyone has a chance to speak, rather than 

letting a vocal few dominate the discussion. 

3 If the group is conducted in a language that observers don’t understand, provide a translator in the 

observation room. 

66 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

The Moderator’s Role 

The moderator or interviewer doesn’t need to be an expert on your topic, but he or she should be briefed


well enough to ask appropriate questions and must have experience in facilitating group discussions.


Rehearse with the moderator any topics or concerns you want emphasized or discussed in depth. The


moderator’s guide is just that, a guide. Experienced moderators flow with the conversation, ask questions


that are not leading or closed ended, and sequence to the next topic when appropriate or deviate from it


to avoid awkward transitions or unnecessary banter between topics.


A good moderator has the following characteristics: 

■	 The moderator understands what information you’re seeking, how you need to use it, and how to


probe and guide the discussion to get the information. He or she makes sure all agreed-on topics


are covered sufficiently.


■	 The moderator builds rapport and trust, and probes without reacting to or influencing participants’


opinions. He or she emphasizes to participants that there are no right or wrong answers.


■	 The moderator understands the process of eliciting comments, keeps the discussion on track, and


finds other ways to approach a topic if necessary.


■	 He or she leads the discussion and isn’t led by the group. 

Use local advertising agencies, the American Marketing Association’s GreenBook: Worldwide Directory of


Focus Group Companies and Services (2003), or the Qualitative Research Consultants Association to find


a good moderator. If your organization plans to conduct focus groups regularly by using your internal


staff, consider hiring a skilled, experienced moderator to train your staff to moderate focus groups. 


Near the end of a focus group, the moderator 

may give participants an activity or simply 

check with the observers to find out if they 

have additional questions. Notes can be discreetly given to the moderator throughout the 

session if the observers want other questions 

asked or changes made. 

Step 7: Analyze and use results. 

In many analyses of focus groups or interviews, 

the goal is to look for general trends and agreement on issues while noting differing opinions. 

In some instances, the goal is to capture a 

range of opinions. Keep an eye out for individual comments that raise interesting ideas or 

important concerns, such as lack of cultural 

sensitivity or difficulty in comprehension. 

One advantage of the focus group/interview 

method is that the moderator’s guide and 

any materials presented can be revised 

between sessions. 

Reviewing transcripts is the easiest and most 

thorough way to analyze the sessions, 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 67 
although the sessions can be analyzed less 

thoroughly by reviewing notes taken during 

the discussion. Avoid counting or quantifying 

types of responses (e.g., “75 percent of 

participants preferred concept A”). Because 

this is qualitative research, you can’t quantify 

the results or suggest that they represent the 

opinions of the audience as a whole. 

Results are worthless if they aren’t used. Use 

them to answer the questions you drafted to 

guide the research design—to shape the campaign strategy, message, and materials design. 

Also, your results help you “sell” your program 

as “researched and tested.” Share your findings 

with partners and others who might benefit. 

Estimated Costs of Focus Groups 

and Interviews 

The cost estimates in Table 3.2 can help you 

budget for pretesting if you’re using commercial research firms. Your actual costs will vary 

depending on your location, the target 

audience being recruited, and the amount of 

time contributed by staff, contractors, and 

participants. For example, if your staff includes 

a focus group expert who can analyze the 

results, you won’t have to pay a contractor for 

that task. However, don’t jeopardize the quality 

of your results with a budget that’s too small. 

The estimates for focus groups assume that 

you conduct two groups, each with 10 memTable 3.2: Estimated Costs of Two Focus Groups and 10 Individual In-Depth Interviews Conducted With 

Participants From the General Population 

Item Costs of Two Focus 

Groups 

Costs of 10 Individual 

In-Depth Interviews 

Develop screener* $800–$1,000 $800–$1,200 

Develop discussion guide* $800–$1,200 $800–$1,600 

Recruit participants $1,500–$2,000 $750–$1,500 

Rent facility $700–$1,000 $1,000–$2,000 

Provide respondent incentives/refreshments $600–$1,500 $0–$500 

Hire moderator or interviewer $1,500–$2,100 $500–$1,000 

Audiotape and videotape sessions 

Transcribe audiotapes $500–$800 $300–$400 

Analyze research findings and write report* $1,600–$2,400 $1,600–$2,400 

Total $8,000–$12,000 $5,750–$10,600 

68 

*One-time costs that will not be incurred for each group. 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

bers of the general population. This size is for 

cost estimates only. Most program managers 

prefer groups of five to eight, because doing so 

more easily engages all group members in 

conversation, but others prefer groups of eight 

to 12. In either case, larger numbers frequently 

are recruited to allow for some “no-shows.” 

However, if more people show up than you 

need, you must still give them any promised 

incentive. Also, recruiting specific, hard-to-find 

target audiences may be more expensive than 

selecting a group from the general population. 

The cost estimates also assume that each 

session is two hours long, conducted in 

English, and audiotaped. Staff travel, food for 

participants, and videotaping, which is useful 

when some of your program team can’t 

directly observe the session, are not included. 

The interview estimate shown in Table 3.2 

assumes 10 half-hour interviews that are 

conducted in English and audiotaped. 

Quasi-Quantitative Research 

Quasi-quantitative tools are used most often to 

pretest messages and materials, as noted 

earlier. These tools include central location 

intercept interviews and theater-style pretests. 

If you pretest many ads using the same 

methodology and the same questions, you can 

develop a database of results that allows you to 

assess the relative strengths of various ads. 

Central Location Intercept Interviews 

In central location intercept interviews, 

interviewers go to a place frequented by 

members of the target audience and ask them 

to participate in a study. If they agree, they’re 

asked specific screening questions to determine whether they fit the recruitment criteria. 

If they do, the interviewers take them to the 

interviewing station (a quiet spot at a 

shopping mall or other site), show them the 

pretest materials, and then administer the 

pretest questionnaire. The interview should 

last no longer than 15 to 20 minutes. 

For intercept interviews to be effective, you 

must obtain results from at least 100 of each 

type of respondent or more if you want to 

break out specific subgroups (e.g., males vs. 

females or age groups) (NCI 2002). 

Pros: 

■	 You increase your chances of finding the 

right participants if you choose the right 

location. 

■	 You can connect with harder-to-reach 

respondents and present them with a 

stimulus (an ad, graphics, messages, or 

a brochure). 

■	 The interviews can be conducted quickly. 

■	 The interviews are a cost-effective way 

to gather data in a relatively short time. 

Cons: 

■	 You must train interviewers. 

■	 Your results aren’t representative and 

can’t be generalized. 

■	 Intercept interviews aren’t appropriate 

for sensitive issues or potentially threatening questions. 

■	 Intercept interviews aren’t appropriate 

for in-depth questions, and they don’t 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 69 
allow you to probe for additional information easily. 

■	 Respondents might not want to be interviewed on the spot. Although setting up 

prearranged appointments is time consuming and more expensive, ultimately 

it may save time if respondents won’t 

cooperate in a central location. 

Developing the Questionnaire 

Unlike focus groups or individual interviews, 

the questionnaire used in central location 

intercept interviews is highly structured and 

contains primarily multiple-choice or closedended questions to permit quick responses. 

Open-ended questions, which allow freeflowing answers, should be kept to a minimum, because they take too much time for the 

respondent to answer and for the interviewer 

to record. Questions that assess the audience’s 

comprehension and perceptions of the pretest 

materials form the core of the questionnaire. 

The interview may also include a few questions tailored to the specific item(s) being 

pretested (e.g., “Do you prefer this picture or 

this one?”). As with any research instrument, 

the questionnaire should be pilot tested before 

it’s used in the field. (See Appendix 3.6 for a 

Sample Intercept Interview Questionnaire.) 

Setting Up Interviews 

A number of market research companies 

throughout the country conduct central 

location intercept interviews in shopping 

malls. You can also conduct these interviews in 

clinic waiting rooms, religious institutions, 

Table 3.3: Estimated Costs for Central Location 

Intercept Interviews Conducted With 100 

Participants From the General Population 

Item Costs 

Develop questionnaire 

Print questionnaire 

Schedule facility and phones 

Screen and conduct interviews 

Provide respondent incentives 

Code, enter data, and tabulate 

Analyze research findings and 

write report 

$750–$3,500 

$400–$600 

$2,000–$3,500 

$600–$750 

$850–$1,300 

$1,500–$3,500 

Total $6,100–$13,150 

Social Security offices, schools, work sites, 

train stations, and other locations frequented 

by audience members. You must obtain 

permission from the site well before you want 

to set up interviewing stations. 

If you’re using a market research company to 

conduct the interviews, provide the company 

with the screening criteria and the pretest 

materials in appropriate formats and quantities. Some companies have offices in shopping 

malls, and some offices have one-way mirrors 

that allow you to watch the interviews. 

University and college departments of marketing, communication, or health education 

might be able to provide interviewer training, 

trained student interviewers, or both. Pretesting 

is an excellent real-world project for a faculty 

member to adopt as a class project or for a 

70 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

master’s degree student to use as a thesis 

project. However, this approach may mean you 

don’t get your results as quickly, and you may 

compromise the quality of the research if the 

individuals lack the appropriate experience. 

Table 3.3 shows estimated costs for central 

location intercept interviews. These costs are 

based on questioning 100 respondents from the 

general population for 15 to 20 minutes each. 

Central location intercept interviews might not 

be feasible if your audience is geographically 

dispersed or does not have easy access to a 

central facility. In those cases, you can use 

telephone interviews and send materials to 

participants in advance. This type of pretest 

typically resembles an individual interviewing 

project in cost and number of interviews, but 

more closed-ended questions may be used 

and the question sequence may be followed 

more closely. 

Recruiting Participants 

If your organization is recruiting the participants, you’ll need to develop screening 

criteria, a script, and training for approaching 

audience members. The interviewer should be 

familiar with the screening criteria and 

approach only those people who appear to fit 

the criteria. Whenever the people approached 

don’t qualify, the interviewer should thank 

them for their time and willingness to 

participate. If they do qualify, the interviewer 

can bring them to a designated location and 

proceed with the interview. 

Theater-Style Pretests 

Theater-style pretests are most commonly 

used to assess the effectiveness of TV ads. 

Animated video storyboards are used to select 

Use of Theater-Style Pretesting To Compare Ad Formats 

Theater-style pretesting was used with youth and adults to compare the effectiveness of two Massachusetts 

ads, “Cowboy” and “Models.” This method was chosen because norms had been established over time, and 

results of the two ad pretests could be compared with those of previous pretests. In “Cowboy,” a man tells 

the story of his brother, a former actor in Marlboro ads who died from lung cancer at a young age. In 

“Models,” the U.S. women’s soccer team discusses the negative impact of smoking on sports performance. 

Both ads also include a message about how the tobacco industry manipulates and influences people. Both 

are black-and-white ads featuring people talking to the camera. 

“Cowboy” scored better than “Models” on several key measures, including recall of the main message and 

how convincing and engaging it was. “Cowboy” also scored better than most ads previously pretested with 

the same method. The respondents’ verbatim comments helped explain why. The respondents were very 

moved by the real story of the man losing his brother because he smoked cigarettes. They vividly recalled 

many more details about “Cowboy” than about “Models,” and male and female respondents alike said the 

ad was realistic and made them cry. They also frequently commented on an image in which the former 

Marlboro man is in a hospital bed attached to numerous tubes. 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 71 
the best concept, or a rough-cut (near-finished) 

ad is pretested as a “disaster check.” Participants are invited to a central location to watch 

a pilot for a new TV program. During the 

program, they’re exposed to several ads, 

including the pretest ad. After the show, participants complete a questionnaire. They first 

respond to questions about the show and then 

answer questions about the pretest materials, 

to determine how effectively the message was 

communicated and what their overall 

reactions were. For theater-style pretests to be 

effective, you must obtain results from at least 

100 respondents of each type (NCI 2002). 

Pros: 

■	 You can obtain responses from a large 

number of respondents at the same time. 

■	 Running the ad as part of TV programming allows you to more closely 

replicate participants’ experiences of 

watching TV at home. 

Con: 

■	 Your results aren’t representative and 

can’t be generalized. 

During theater-style pretests, participants are 

invited to a conveniently located meeting 

room or auditorium that is set up for screening 

a TV program. Participants should be told only 

that their reactions to a TV program are being 

sought, not the real purpose of the gathering. 

The program can be any entertaining, nonhealth-related video presentation that is 15 to 

30 minutes long. About halfway through the 

program, some commercials are shown, and 

your message is among them. 

Table 3.4: Estimated Costs of a Theater-Style Pretest 

Conducted With 100 Participants From the General 

Population 

Item Costs 

Develop questionnaire $400–$2,400 

Produce questionnaire $400–$600 

Recruit participants $4,500–$6,000 

Rent facility $0–$$$* 

Rent audiovisual equipment $0–$2,000 

Conduct theater-style pretest $0–$800 

Provide respondent incentives $3,000–$5,000 

Code, enter data, and tabulate $800–$3,200 

Analyze research findings 

and write report $1,600–$3,200 

Total $10,700–$23,200+ 

*The cost of large facilities (e.g., hotel ballrooms) 

varies widely by geographic region. Check with local 

facilities for approximate costs. 

After the program, participants receive a questionnaire designed to gauge their reactions to 

the program. Then they complete a section of 

questions focusing on the ad. 

In some cases, one-half of the audience is sent 

home and the rest are asked to stay. The 

remaining group watches your ad again and 

answers several additional questions. The 

participants who were sent home are called 

back two to three days later and asked 

questions about the ad, to determine how well 

they recalled the ad and its main message. 

72 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

In more sophisticated theater-style pretests, 

participants answer questions by using automated audience-response systems. They are 

given a small device with response keys that 

they push when a question is asked. The data 

are automatically tabulated, giving you instant 

access to the numbers. Questions can be 

instantly added or deleted from the questionnaire on the basis of the previous responses. 

However, an automated system is much more 

costly to use than a standard paper-and-pencil 

questionnaire. 

15-minute video on smoking cessation that 

will be shown in a clinic. You should have 

participants view a series of videos that 

includes yours. Participants evaluate the 

videos the same way they evaluate ads, but 

these sessions last longer than ad pretests. 

If you’re using print ads, try a variation of the 

theater-style pretest. In this method, several 

ads, including yours, are inserted into a 

magazine. Participants are asked to read an 

article with the ads interspersed and are given 

enough time to finish the article. Then they 

complete a questionnaire designed to gauge 

their reactions to the article and ads, as well as 

a section containing questions focusing on the 

ads. Finally, your ad is displayed alone, and 

participants respond to several more questions. 

Table 3.4 shows the estimated costs of a theaterstyle pretest conducted with 100 participants. 

Pretesting Other Media 

Theater-style pretesting also can be used to 

assess video presentations, such as a 10- to 

Using a Mix of Research Methods 

The World Health Organization and CDC worked with an agency to develop several advertising concepts 

to encourage smokers to try to quit with help. The likelihood of successful smoking cessation increases 

greatly if the smoker takes advantage of help (e.g., counseling, a “quitline,” written materials, physician’s 

advice, and pharmacological products). The concepts were shared with smokers in one-on-one 

interviews, and one ad concept was selected for production. The ad was produced, but before it was 

recommended to countries to air, it was pretested through a central location intercept method. 

This research showed that the number of respondents who preferred calling a quitline was nearly equal 

to the number who preferred visiting a Web site for help in quitting. It was decided that when possible, 

both a toll-free phone number and a Web site should be provided on the tag at the end of the ad. 

In addition, although smokers understood the message well, they didn’t believe it was forceful enough. 

Because the audio presentation was a “voiceover” and the wording could be changed inexpensively 

before finishing the ad, the agency made the wording more direct and also selected a different actor who 

had a more confident voice. 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 73 
Designing and Conducting a TheaterStyle Pretest 

There are six steps for designing and conducting theater-style pretests, but many ideas, particularly those in Step 2, also are useful for 

central location intercept interviews. The six 

steps are as follows: 

1.	 Plan the pretest. 

2.	 Develop the questionnaire. 

3.	 Recruit participants. 

4.	 Prepare for the pretest. 

5.	 Conduct the pretest. 

6.	 Analyze the pretest. 

Step 1: Plan the pretest. 

Determine your requirements for the following 

information: 

■	 What you want to learn 

■	 When you need the results 

■	 What your budget is 

■	 Which contractors are qualified to do 

this work 

■	 What criteria participants should be 

required to meet (Your contractor can 

help you to determine these criteria.) 

■	 Which facility you’ll use (Your 

contractor will make this decision.) 

The facility must be large enough to accommodate all your participants simultaneously. 

Several video monitors may be needed for all 

participants to see the program well. 

You can also rent space, such as a hotel ballroom, if you want to pretest materials among 

a large number of people. Hotels often have 

audiovisual equipment available for rent. You 

must reserve facilities and equipment well in 

advance of your pretest. 

Some market research companies conduct 

theater-style pretesting. They can provide 

details about the process they follow in 

conducting this pretesting. 

Step 2: Develop the questionnaire. 

Work with your contractor to carefully construct the questionnaire. At a minimum, it 

should contain three parts: 

■	 Recall and communication of the main 

idea of pretest materials 

■	 Audience reaction to pretest materials 

■	 Demographic characteristics of the 

participants 

Recall and Communication of the Main Idea 

The standard questions on recall and communication of the main idea are critical to the 

pretest. They address some of the most 

important measures of a message’s potential 

effectiveness: 

■	 Whether it attracts the audience’s


attention (recall)


■	 Whether it communicates your main 

point (main idea) 

■	 What respondents thought and how they 

felt when they viewed the ad (e.g., potential persuasiveness and believability) 

74 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

See main idea questions in Appendix 3.6: 

Sample Intercept Interview Questionnaire. 

Keep in mind that the sample questionnaire 

was designed for research in which the ad was 

shown among a group of ads, not within a 

pilot TV program. 

Audience Reaction 

Include several standard questions on 

audience reaction that address your specific 

concerns about your message. Suppose your 

message asks viewers to call a toll-free number 

for more information. You may want to ask, 

“What action, if any, does the message ask 

you to take?” or “Did the telephone number 

appear on the screen long enough for you 

to remember it?” 

If possible, develop one or more questions 

addressing each characteristic of your message. 

Use the following list of characteristics 

commonly found in messages to determine 

which ones apply to your message, and 

develop questions that focus on these 

characteristics: 

■	 Use of music (with or without lyrics) 

■	 Use of a famous spokesperson 

■	 Use of telephone numbers 

■	 Use of mailing addresses 

■	 Request for a particular action 

■	 Instructions for performing a specific 

health behavior 

■	 Presentation of technical or medical 

information 

■	 Presentation of new information 

■	 Promotion of a sponsoring organization 

or event 

■	 Representation of characters intended 

to be typical of the target audience 

■	 Use of a voiceover announcer 

■	 Presentation of controversial or


unpleasant information


Some theater-style pretests don’t ask specific 

questions about characteristics of each ad; 

instead, they rely on the respondents to 

volunteer reactions about the ads. When 

compiled, the responses often suggest patterns 

indicating perceptions about elements of the 

ad (e.g., confusing, polarizing, persuasive, or 

credible). See Appendix 3.6, Sample Intercept 

Interview Questionnaire, for examples of 

open-ended questions to gauge respondents’ 

reactions, and closed-ended questions to 

assess respondents’ perceptions about the 

pretest ad. Remember that the objective of 

pretesting is to uncover any problems with 

your ad before final production or airing. 

Demographics 

Questions about demographics record the 

participants’ characteristics (e.g., sex, age, level 

of education, and health status). This information will help you later if you need to separate 

and analyze the data by subgroups. 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 75 
Step 3: Recruit participants. 

Your contractor will recruit participants for a 

recruiting fee. You’ll also pay an incentive to 

participants. (See section on Focus Groups, 

earlier in this chapter, for information on 

recruiting participants.) 

Step 4: Prepare for the pretest. 

Before the pretest session, your contractor 

should make sure that all arrangements are 

made. This checklist may be helpful: 

■	 Has participant recruitment taken place 

as scheduled? Were participants 

reminded to attend? Do they have 

transportation and correct directions? 

■	 Have the moderators or interviewers 

rehearsed? 

■	 Is the meeting room or other facility 

reserved for you? Is it set up? Are enough 

chairs available? Are extra chairs 

available in case more people show up 

than you expect? Is the heating or air 

conditioning working properly? Do you 

know where the light switches are? If a 

microphone is needed, is it set up and 

functioning properly? 

■	 Is the pretesting videotape ready? Are 

the video and audio portions of the tape 

clear? 

■	 Are the videocassette recorder (VCR) 

and TV monitors working properly? 

Do you need another monitor so that 

everyone will be able to see the 

program? 

■	 Are enough copies of the pretest questionnaire on hand? Is each questionnaire complete (no pages missing)? Are 

there enough pencils for participants? 

Will they need clipboards or pads? 

Step 5: Conduct the pretest. 

The following checklist is useful for conducting 

the pretest: 

■	 Have everything organized and working 

before the session. 

■	 Conduct a dry run to check on equipment and timing. 

■	 Be friendly and courteous to participants from the moment they arrive until 

they leave. (Remember to thank them.) 

■	 Have a backup plan in case “surprises” 

occur (e.g., a large number of no-shows, 

too many participants, equipment 

failure, or a disruptive individual). 

The session should take no more than one 

hour and 15 minutes if you’re organized and 

well prepared. 

Step 6: Analyze the pretest. 

Analyze the questionnaires in two steps. First, 

tabulate or count how many participants gave 

each possible response to each question, and 

look for patterns in the responses to both 

closed-ended and open-ended questions. The 

patterns will help you to draw conclusions 

about the effectiveness of your message. 

76 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

Then look at the overall results, and answer 

these questions to determine whether your 

message is both effective and appropriate or 

whether you need to revise your message 

before implementation: 

■	 What did you learn from the pretest? 

■	 Did your message receive a favorable 

audience reaction? 

■	 Did your message fulfill its 


communication objectives?


■	 What are your message’s strengths? 

Weaknesses? 

■	 Did answers to any particular 


question stand out?


■	 Should you revise your message? 


If so, how?


Quantitative Research 

Quantitative research is used to: 

■	 Determine the percentage of your target 

audience that has certain behaviors, 

behavioral intentions, attitudes, and 

knowledge of your subject 

■	 Monitor the audience’s use of materials 

and awareness of your communication 

program and its tactics 

■	 Measure progress toward the program’s 

objectives, such as changes in beliefs, 

knowledge, attitudes, and behavior (See 

Chapter 5: Evaluating the Success of 

Your Counter-Marketing Program for 

more information.) 

Surveys are a primary tool in quantitative 

research. They’re used in a program’s planning 

and assessment stages to obtain baseline and 

tracking information. They also can be useful 

in gaining insights into a target audience and 

gauging reactions to potential core messages. 

Surveys generally involve large numbers of 

respondents (300 or more) and questionnaires 

with predominantly closed-ended questions. 

Pros: 

■	 Random sampling can be used in 


surveys to obtain results that can be


generalized to the target population,


providing better direction for planning


programs and messages.


■	 Participants can be anonymous, which


is beneficial for sensitive topics.


■	 Surveys can include visual material 


and can be used to pretest items such 


as prototypes. 


Cons: 

■	 Surveys limit the ability to probe


answers. 


■	 There’s a risk that the people who are


more willing to respond may share


characteristics that don’t apply to the


audience as a whole, creating a potential


bias in the research. 


■	 Surveys can be costly and time 


consuming.


■	 Response rates are declining, especially


for telephone and Internet surveys


(Singer, et al. 2000).


Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 77 
Most surveys are customized to answer a 

specific set of research questions. Some 

surveys are omnibus studies, in which you add 

questions about your topic to an existing 

survey. A number of national and local public 

opinion polls offer this option. 

Table 3.5 displays the pros and cons of different survey formats. 

Designing and Conducting a Survey 

To design and conduct a survey, follow the 

same basic steps used for the other types of 

research outlined earlier in this chapter: 

1.	 Plan the research. 

2.	 Decide how the survey participants will 

be selected and contacted. 

3.	 Develop and pretest the questionnaire. 

4.	 Collect the data. 

5.	 Analyze the results. 

Quantitative surveys involve complex topics— 

such as sampling size and composition, questionnaire design, and analysis of quantitative 

data—that are beyond the scope of this chapter. 

(See Chapter 5: Evaluating the Success of Your 

Counter-Marketing Program for more information on planning a survey.) 

Other Market Research Tools 

Other tools can help you gain insights into 

your target audience and develop effective 

messages and materials. These tools include 

diaries and activity logs, gatekeeper reviews, 

and readability pretesting. 

Diaries and Activity Logs 

Diaries and activity logs are written records of 

what occurred each day, week, or other time 

period during a program’s planning or execution. These records are kept and updated by 

people from whom you want input and feedback about the program. They’re commonly 

used to: 

■	 Track program implementation 

■	 Assess the effectiveness of program 

implementation 

■	 Pilot test an intervention 

■	 Monitor whether planned activities are 

on schedule and within budget 

■	 Learn what questions program participants asked 

■	 Determine what technical assistance 

program staff needed 

■	 Track the audience’s exposure to


program components


■	 Gain insights about the audience’s 

relevant day-to-day experiences (e.g., 

smokers can record each time they 

smoked a cigarette, and how they felt 

before, during, and after smoking the 

cigarette, providing insights into how 

smokers feel about smoking and how 

you might be able to help them quit) 

If you plan to use diaries or activity logs to 

gauge the quality of program planning or 

execution, be sure the diaries and logs are 

started as soon as you begin program planning. Have program managers or participants 

78 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

Table 3.5: Pros and Cons of Survey Formats 

Format Pros Cons 

Mail 

• Mail can be a cost-effective way 

to access hard-to-reach populations (e.g., the homebound or 

rural residents). 

• Respondents can answer questions when it’s most convenient 

for them. 

• Mail is not appropriate for 

respondents with limited 

literacy skills. 

• Low response rate diminishes 

the value of results. 

• Expensive follow-up by mail or 

telephone may be necessary to 

increase the response rate. 

• Respondents may return 

incomplete questionnaires. 

• Responses can be difficult to 

read. 

• Receiving enough responses 

may take a long time. 

• Postage may be expensive if the 

sample is large or the questionnaire is long. 

Telephone 

With interviewer using 

paper-and-pencil questionnaires. 

• Telephone is appropriate for 

those with limited literacy 

skills. 

• Questionnaires can be more 

complete. 

• The sequence of questions can 

be controlled. 

• Potential respondents without 

telephones can’t participate. 

• Respondents may hang up if 

they believe the survey is part 

of a solicitation call or if they 

don’t want to take the time to 

participate. 

• Response rates are declining, 

especially for telephone and 

Internet surveys (Singer, et al. 

2000). 

With interviewer using 

computer-assisted 

telephone interviewing 

(CATI). 

• “Skip patterns” can be 

included, which is useful for 

complex questionnaires. 

• The need for data entry is 

eliminated. 

• CATI software and computers 

are required. 

• Extensive interviewer training is 

needed. 

• Time is required to program 

questionnaire into CATI. 

Continues 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 79 
Table 3.5: Pros and Cons of Survey Formats (cont.) 

Format Pros Cons 

In Person 

Administered by 

interviewer. 

• Face-to-face persuasion tactics 

can be used to increase response 

rates. 

• Participants with limited literacy 

skills can use this method. 

• The method is useful with hardto-reach populations (e.g., 

homeless or with low literacy) or 

when the intended audience can’t 

be surveyed by using other datacollection methods. 

• Interviewer can clarify questions 

for respondents. 

• More questionnaires are completed.

• Administration is more expensive than self-administered 

surveys or telephone data 

collection. 

• This method may not be 

appropriate for sensitive issues 

because respondents may not 

answer as truthfully in person. 

Self-administered: 

Respondents asked to 

complete survey at a location frequented by the 

target population (e.g., 

during a conference, in a 

classroom, or after viewing an exhibit at a health 

fair). 

• Harder-to-reach respondents can 

be contacted in locations convenient and comfortable for them. 

• The survey can be conducted 

quickly. 

• Data can be gathered cost-effectively in a relatively short time. 

• Selecting an appropriate location 

can result in an increased number 

of respondents from intended 

population. 

• The ability to reach respondents 

in person at a central location or 

gathering is required. 

• Respondents must have 

complex, mature literacy skills. 

Self-administered on 

computer: 

Questionnaire is displayed 

on a computer screen and 

respondents key in 

answers. 

• “Skip patterns” can be included, 

which is useful for complex 

questionnaires. 

• The sequence of questions can 

be controlled. 

• Need for data entry is eliminated, 

and quick summary and analysis 

of results are provided. 

• Use is not appropriate for audiences with limited literacy skills 

or those uncomfortable with 

computers. 

• Expensive technical equipment is 

required that may not be readily 

available or may be cumbersome 

in many settings. 

• Respondents must have access to 

programmed computers and be 

comfortable using computers. 

80 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

Table 3.5: Pros and Cons of Survey Formats (cont.) 

Format Pros Cons 

Internet 

Self-administered on 

computer: 

Questionnaire displayed 

on respondent’s computer screen through a Web 

site. 

• “Skip patterns” can be included, 

which is useful for complex 

questionnaires. 

• The sequence of questions can be 

controlled. 

• The need for data entry is eliminated, and quick summary and 

analysis of results are provided. 

• Use is not appropriate for audiences 

with limited literacy skills or those 

uncomfortable with computers. 

• Respondents must have Internet 

access and be comfortable using 

computers. 

• There’s no way to confirm the 

validity of identifying information 

provided by respondents. 

• Response rates are declining, especially for telephone and Internet 

surveys (Singer, et al. 2000). 

• Samples are not representative. 

put the diary or log information into a specific 

format. This information may cover issues 

such as the quality of program components or 

how your audience uses the components. (See 

Chapter 5: Evaluating the Success of Your 

Counter-Marketing Program for guidance on 

planning and conducting program evaluation.) 

Pros: 

■	 Diaries and logs give respondents
 

flexibility in their answers. 
 

■	 These records enable researchers to 

observe behavior over time, rather than 

only once. 

Cons: 

■	 Diaries and logs require considerable 

effort by respondents and may not be 

filled out in a timely or thorough 

manner. For this reason, offering 

incentives for completing the diaries or 


logs is important. 


■	 The data may be voluminous and 

challenging to code and compare. 

■	 These records can be hard to read and 

are thus not appropriate for respondents with low literacy or poor writing 

skills or penmanship.Here are the five 

major steps for diary or activity log 

research: 

1. 	 Plan the research. 

2. 	 Identify who will complete the 


diaries or activity logs. 


3. 	 Develop and pretest the form for 


collecting information. 


4. 	 Collect the data. 

5. 	 Analyze the results. 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 81 
Step 1: Plan the research. 

Determine the following information: 

■	 What you want to learn 

■	 How much information you need 

■	 When you need the information 

■	 How you’ll apply what you learn 

■	 What your budget is 

■	 What your criteria are for participants 

Step 2: Identify who will complete the 

diaries or activity logs. 

The participants you select depend on the 

goals of your research. If you’re focusing on 

your audience’s day-to-day experiences in 

relation to some aspect of tobacco use, you’ll 

want audience members to complete the 

diaries. For example, if you want teenagers to 

keep diaries documenting when they 

encountered tobacco among friends, family 

members, and others in their lives and how 

those encounters made them feel, recruit 

teenagers willing to participate. (When 

recruiting youth respondents, you may need 

parental permission.) 

If you’re focusing on participants’ experience 

with a program as a pilot test, you’ll want the 

participants to keep the diaries. You’re likely to 

recruit participants on site. You’ll probably 

need to provide an incentive (e.g., a gift 

certificate once the completed diary is 

received), and you also may need to remind 

participants to return the diaries at the end of 

the research period. 

Step 3: Develop and pretest the form for 

collecting information. 

Here’s how to create a user-friendly document 

to collect the data: 

■	 Write questions that are specific to your 

objectives. For example, for a pilot test 

of a health education program, provide 

a description of the module(s) used 

each day and include entries such as 

the following: 

– 	Date 

– 	 Title of module used 

– 	 Description of activities completed 

– 	 Record of how long activities took to 

complete 

– 	 Response to whether the respondent 

would participate in these activities 

again 

– 	 Reasons the respondent would or 

would not participate again 

■	 Include examples of participant 
 

feedback. 
 

■	 For a log related to smoking behavior, 

you might include entries such as the 

following: 

– 	 When the first cigarette of the day 

was smoked 

– 	 What the person was doing when 

smoking each cigarette 

– 	 Whom the person was with when 

smoking each cigarette 

– 	 How the person was feeling when he 

or she most wanted a cigarette 

82 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

■	 Pretest the draft diary or log with
 

members of your audience.
 

■	 Revise questions people found 

confusing during the pretest. If a 

question was confusing to only one 

person, use your judgment about 

whether to change the question. If you 

make substantial changes to the diary 

or log, conduct another pretest before 

finalizing the form. 

Step 4: Collect the data. 

Produce enough diaries or logs so that each 

respondent has several extra forms in case 

they are needed. Attach detailed written 

instructions to each form. Deliver the diaries 

or logs to respondents before training, as 

necessary or at least one week before the 

research begins. If you’re asking program 

participants to complete diaries or logs, you’ll 

have to distribute the materials on site. Give 

respondents a fixed time frame to complete 

these records (e.g., one week or six months), 

and provide a way to return the data to you 

(e.g., an envelope and postage). If your research 

period is longer than one or two weeks, you 

may want to ask respondents to send the first 

week of data, so you can review the logs for 

accuracy and completeness and even begin to 

tally information. Collect the logs at several 

points during the research period, to ensure 

that participants are filling them out regularly; 

otherwise they may fill them out all at once at 

the end of the period. 

Step 5: Analyze the results. 

In the planning phase, you determined what 

you wanted to learn from the research. Now 

you can look through the diaries or logs to 

answer those questions. Diaries generally 

contain qualitative information. Activity logs 

may contain both quantitative information 

you can tabulate easily (e.g., how many people 

called a hotline each day) and qualitative 

information (e.g., reasons people liked or 

participated in an activity). Here are some 

suggestions for analyzing both types of 

information: 

■	 To analyze qualitative information, 


search the data for similarities and 


differences among diaries or logs, for all 


the questions. Look for general themes 


or patterns. The best way to analyze 


these themes is to develop categories for 


the responses. For example, if you want 


to know why teachers thought their 


students liked or disliked a certain 


educational module in your program, 


you might group responses into 


categories such as “challenging,” “fun,” 


“too much work,” and “boring.” You may 


add or combine categories as you go 


along. You can make inferences about 


the diary information (e.g., “most 


teachers liked the module because...”), 


but resist the temptation to quantify this 


information. 


■	 To analyze quantitative responses, cre­


ate a coding sheet for each quantitative 


Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 83 
question, writing the question at the top 

and creating columns for each possible 

response. For example, for a question in 

an activity log about how many people 

picked up particular brochures, you 

could create these columns: 0, 1–5, 6–10, 

11–15, 16–20, and >20. Then record the 

response from each log by making a 

check mark in the appropriate column. 

Tally the check marks in each column, 

and calculate the percentage of participants who gave each type of response. 

Gatekeeper Reviews 

Educational materials for the public and for 

patients often are routed to their intended 

audiences through health professionals or 

other individuals or organizations that can 

communicate for you. These intermediaries 

act as gatekeepers, controlling the distribution 

channels that reach your audiences. Their 

approval or disapproval of your materials can 

be a critical factor in your program’s success. If 

they don’t like a poster or don’t believe it’s 

credible or scientifically accurate, it may never 

reach your audience. 

Gatekeeper review of rough materials should 

be considered part of the pretesting process, 

although it’s no substitute for pretesting 

materials with audience members. It’s also no 

substitute for obtaining clearances or expert 

review for technical accuracy; that should be 

done before pretesting. Sometimes telling the 

gatekeeper that technical experts have reviewed the material for accuracy will reassure them 

and may speed approval of your message. 

How you obtain gatekeeper reviews depends 

on your resources, including time and budget. 

Two methods are common: 

1.	 Self-administered questionnaires. 

Gatekeepers are sent the materials and 

the questionnaire at the same time. (See 

Appendix 3.5 for an example.) 

2.	 Interviewer-administered questionnaires. 

Typically, an appointment for the interview is scheduled with the gatekeeper, 

and the materials are sent for review in 

advance. 

Questionnaires should be written to ask about 

overall reactions to the materials, including an 

assessment of whether the information is 

appropriate and useful. 

In some cases, a formal questionnaire might 

not be feasible, especially if you don’t think the 

gatekeeper will take the time to fill it out. 

Arrange a telephone or personal conversation 

or a meeting to review the materials. Consider 

in advance which questions you want to ask, 

and bring a list of these questions with you. 

One advantage of this approach is that you can 

use the discussion with gatekeepers to introduce them to your program and to ask if they 

want to become involved. 

84 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 
Designing and Implementing an Effective Tobacco Counter-Marketing Campaign 

Readability Pretesting 

Readability formulas often are used to assess 

the reading level of materials. Reading level 

refers to the number of years of education 

required for a reader to understand a written 

passage. Some experts suggest aiming for a 

level that is two to five grades lower than the 

average grade your audience has achieved, to 

account for a probable decline in reading skills 

over time. Others say a third- to fifth-grade 

level is frequently appropriate for readers with 

low literacy. 

When the target audience is the general 

population, keep publications as simple as 

possible to increase reader comprehension. 

However, if publications are meant for a more 

educated, professional audience, simple 

materials might be considered insulting. 

You’ll need to decide which reading level is 

appropriate for your materials. Then use one 

or more readability formulas to determine 

whether your text is written at that level. Fry, 

Flesch, FOG, and SMOG are among the most 

commonly used readability formulas (NCI 

2002). Applying these formulas is a simple 

process that can be done manually or with a 

computer program in only a few minutes. (See 

the National Cancer Institute’s Making Health 

Communication Programs Work: A Planner’s 

Guide [2002] for more information on 

readability formulas.) 

Typically, readability formulas measure the 

difficulty of the vocabulary used and the 

average sentence length. Readability software 

such as RightWriter and Grammatik analyze a 

document’s grammar, style, word usage, and 

punctuation and then assign a reading level. 

Some popular software programs such as 

Microsoft Word include a readability-testing 

function. However, these formulas don’t 

measure the reader’s level of comprehension. 

Researchers in one study suggest three 

principles for the use of readability formulas 

(NCI 1994): 

1. 	 Use readability formulas only in concert 

with other means of assessing the 

effectiveness of the material. 

2. 	 Use a formula only when the readers 

for whom a text is intended are similar 

to those on whom the formula was 

validated. 

3. 	 Do not write a text with readability 

formulas in mind. 

Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights 85 
Points To Remember 

■	 Gaining insights about the target audience is central to developing effective countermarketing strategies, tactics, and messages. 

■	 Market research should be an integral part of your counter-marketing program. 

■	 Market research isn’t a do-it-yourself effort. Not only do you need to be knowledgeable, but you also need to seek the appropriate resources to ensure that your 

research is successfully designed and conducted. 

■	 Many tobacco control program staff have used market research and are good 

sources of advice on design, instruments, analysis, and findings. 

■	 Market research findings must be used to be worthwhile. Before you conduct 

research, decide how you’ll use the results to plan, alter, justify, support, and/or 

promote aspects of your program. 

Bibliography 

American Marketing Association, New York Chapter. GreenBook: Worldwide Directory of Focus 

Group Companies and Services. New York, NY: American Marketing Association, 2003. 

American Marketing Association, New York Chapter. GreenBook: Worldwide Directory of Marketing 

Research Companies and Services. New York, NY: American Marketing Association, 2003. 

Marketing Research Association. Blue Book Research Services Directory. White Plains, MD: 

Marketing Research Association, 2003. 

National Cancer Institute. Clear and Simple: Developing Effective Print Materials for Low-Literate 

Readers. Bethesda, MD: National Cancer Institute, 1994. Pub. No. T936. 

NCI. Making Health Communication Programs Work: A Planner’s Guide. Bethesda, MD: U.S. 

Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, National Institutes of Health, 

NCI, 2002. Pub. No. T-0638. 

Singer E, et al. Experiments with incentives in telephone surveys. Public Opinion Quarterly 

2000;64:171–88. 

Teenage Research Unlimited. Counter-Tobacco Advertising Exploratory, Summary Report, 

January–March 1999. Unpublished. 

86 Chapter 3: Gaining and Using Target Audience Insights